Brian Cushing Tested Positive for Hormone hCG

[khesanh]

Houston Texans linebacker Brian Cushing received his four-game suspension because he tested positive for elevated levels of the hormone hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin), which is not a steroid but is a substance commonly used by steroid users to restore normal testosterone levels during down cycles. ESPN's Adam Schefter was the first to report the substance for which Cushing tested positive, and a source close to the situation confirmed the report to FanHouse on Tuesday morning.

This isn't the first time hCG has been a presence in the sports news cycle. Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Manny Ramirez was suspended for 50 games last year when he was found to have a prescription for hCG. And in October of 2008, admitted steroid user, author and reality TV star Jose Canseco was detained at the U.S.-Mexico border near San Diego for trying to bring hCG into this country from Mexico.

[Blackout]

and the AP is going to strip him of his reward

[khesanh]

Yeah that's a wrap

[Jbro22]

Yeah that a wrap

Sounds like me at lunch time.

[Klecko73isGod]

I shall from this point on refer to Brian Cushing as "Lattimer."

[khesanh]

LOL that is funny as hell LOL "Starting defense" "Place at that table baby"

[Klecko73isGod]

LOL that is funny as hell LOL "Starting defense" "Place at that table baby"

You want to laugh? Do a Google image search for "lattimer the program" and guess what picture comes up on page one:

[khesanh]

This has GOT to be photo shopped WOW!!!!!!!

[Boozer76]

This has GOT to be photo shopped WOW!!!!!!!

It's not the photo on the right that is so telling, it's the glorious bitch t!ts he's sporting in the picture on the left that is the dead give away that he's a roid head. It's also why you would want to take HcG on a down cycle to eliminate the man-titty effect as much as possible. When you take steroids, your nuts basically stop producing testosterone on their own becuase your body is overloaded with it from the roids. When you cycle off the roids, your body has a period where little to no testosterone is being naturally produced in your body and estrogen levels start taking over. You literally start growing breasts.

[bitonti]

has any1 else stopped caring about steroids in football?

im at the point where if the players aren't using, im worried.

[Damaged89]

has any1 else stopped caring about steroids in football?

im at the point where if the players aren't using, im worried.

The problem is if everyone has that attitude, why aren't high school kids allowed to use steroids? As someone who was in high school not too long ago I remember the juiceheads and they tended to be hormonal messes. I'm not just talking about the acne and man boobs, I mean the rage problems and suicidal mood swings. I'm not pretending to be a doctor here but it definitely has to be a concern.

[bitonti]

as a general rule high school kids shouldn't drink, smoke, take drugs or have sex.

professional adult American athletes? im just not that outraged anymore.

[Larz]

I wonder who leaked this, and what they hope to gain

[Damaged89]

as a general rule high school kids shouldn't drink, smoke, take drugs or have sex.

professional adult American athletes? im just not that outraged anymore.

I don't think anyone is outraged anymore. I just think that expecting professional athletes to take steroids gives implicit permission to kids to do it to.

[Bruce Banner]

has any1 else stopped caring about steroids in football?

im at the point where if the players aren't using, im worried.

I think they should allow it. I don't buy the argument that kids need athletes as role models. I think the whole idea of role models is another idea from the Sixties that never panned out. And if kids do need role models they can find better ones than pro athletes so discrediting their achievements in the eyes of kids might help. But try telling that to the US Senate.

[Thai Jet]

[quote name='Blackout

[Midget Love 20]

I think they should allow it. I don't buy the argument that kids need athletes as role models. I think the whole idea of role models is another idea from the Sixties that never panned out. And if kids do need role models they can find better ones than pro athletes so discrediting their achievements in the eyes of kids might help. But try telling that to the US Senate.

Fail. Priest Holmes, meet Shawn Merriman. Priest Holmes all but breaks his neck and essentially ended his career with one vicious hit because of steriods. Like it or not, steriods will make super athletes that will taint the game and its history, but put players who are actually playing the game fairly at risk. Plus add in all the other health and risk factors that steriods does to the human body, its not cool at any level -- from the athelete whose a supposed role model for youths, to high school kids. As a current high school coach two sports, the last thing you want to encourage is any sort of drug use to give an advantage over another athlete..or even another way to find a short cut to setting a goal and work honestly and hard toward it.

Contracts should have a clause that if you use preformance enhancing drugs and are caught that you forfeited part of your salary, either bonus or game checks. AP should absolutely revote and take away the ROY award and give it to Byrd on principal

[Bruce Banner]

Fail. Priest Holmes, meet Shawn Merriman. Priest Holmes all but breaks his neck and essentially ended his career with one vicious hit because of steriods. Like it or not, steriods will make super athletes that will taint the game and its history, but put players who are actually playing the game fairly at risk. Plus add in all the other health and risk factors that steriods does to the human body, its not cool at any level -- from the athelete whose a supposed role model for youths, to high school kids. As a current high school coach two sports, the last thing you want to encourage is any sort of drug use to give an advantage over another athlete..or even another way to find a short cut to setting a goal and work honestly and hard toward it.

Contracts should have a clause that if you use preformance enhancing drugs and are caught that you forfeited part of your salary, either bonus or game checks. AP should absolutely revote and take away the ROY award and give it to Byrd on principal

Maybe if Priest Holmes was taking roids too he could handle hits from roided up linebackers better.

There will always be roids in sports, no reason to doom the honest players to second place just because they are following the rules. Let 'em all have roids.

[Jetsfan80]

Maybe if Priest Holmes was taking roids too he could handle hits from roided up linebackers better.

There will always be roids in sports, no reason to doom the honest players to second place just because they are following the rules. Let 'em all have roids.

Not every player is willing to use roids though. They are dangerous to your long-term health and not everyone is willing to sacrifice it, especially players with families. If this happened, the honest players still wouldn't use them and the users would run rampant over the league. The NFL has over 1,000 players, could you imagine if nearly all of them were roid raging monsters, and what that could do not only to the game, but to society?

Just saying "let everyone use them to level the playing field" simply doesn't work. There may always be steroids, but there was a time when there was none and the league was successful and entertaining. Trying to return to that time isn't just idealistic, its the best way to handle it.

[kelticwizard]

Take two competitors for a spot on the team who are equal in ability and who work equally hard. One takes steroids or HGH, one does not. The steroid/HGH user will win out every time.

As a result, the nonsteroid/HGH users will be forced to turn to them to have a realistic chance of making the team.

Since these drugs have proven and severe health risks, many of them unfortunately in future years, you are essentially forcing a youngster to forfeit his future health if he wants to enter the world of big time sports.

This cannot be OK, ever.

[Midget Love 20]

Not every player is willing to use roids though. They are dangerous to your long-term health and not everyone is willing to sacrifice it, especially players with families. If this happened, the honest players still wouldn't use them and the users would run rampant over the league. The NFL has over 1,000 players, could you imagine if nearly all of them were roid raging monsters, and what that could do not only to the game, but to society?

Just saying "let everyone use them to level the playing field" simply doesn't work. There may always be steroids, but there was a time when there was none and the league was successful and entertaining. Trying to return to that time isn't just idealistic, its the best way to handle it.

+1 on this. And Bruce not to sound mean, but you sound like an asshat if you use the rationale "well if Priest Holmes used steriods he would be able to sustain a major injury". Really? Since last time I checked neck and spinal injuries are taken the most serious because of the long and short term problems caused by those injuries. Essentially the only thing you've concluded in 2 responds is a consistent argument: Steriods are okay to use and that they should be allowed. If you like steriods on television, turn on the WWE or any other "wrestling" that you can find because they are all considered a laughing stock mainly because its an entertainment corporation which almost all wrestlers use some sort of steriod or performance enhancer. Unlike the WWE, the NFL is not staged and the hits are real. They're already freakish athletes without the drug, why encourage squads full of roid raged men to throw others in harms way? Just like Jetsfan said, how savage-like would the game become if that happens?

[Bruce Banner]

+1 on this. And Bruce not to sound mean, but you sound like an asshat if you use the rationale "well if Priest Holmes used steriods he would be able to sustain a major injury". Really? Since last time I checked neck and spinal injuries are taken the most serious because of the long and short term problems caused by those injuries. Essentially the only thing you've concluded in 2 responds is a consistent argument: Steriods are okay to use and that they should be allowed. If you like steriods on television, turn on the WWE or any other "wrestling" that you can find because they are all considered a laughing stock mainly because its an entertainment corporation which almost all wrestlers use some sort of steriod or performance enhancer. Unlike the WWE, the NFL is not staged and the hits are real. They're already freakish athletes without the drug, why encourage squads full of roid raged men to throw others in harms way? Just like Jetsfan said, how savage-like would the game become if that happens?

Your argument is pointless. You claim we need the current rules to stop something that happened under the current rules. This fails all logic.

According to you Merriman took roids under the current rules and hurt Holmes with his roid enhanced strength. So, according to you we need to keep these rules to stop something the rules can't stop, according to your own example.

If roids enhance strength they would have enhanced Holmes strength as well. He would have gone into the game without being at a competitive disadvantage. No way this would have hurt him, might have helped.

[Bruce Banner]

Not every player is willing to use roids though. They are dangerous to your long-term health and not everyone is willing to sacrifice it, especially players with families. If this happened, the honest players still wouldn't use them and the users would run rampant over the league. The NFL has over 1,000 players, could you imagine if nearly all of them were roid raging monsters, and what that could do not only to the game, but to society?

Just saying "let everyone use them to level the playing field" simply doesn't work. There may always be steroids, but there was a time when there was none and the league was successful and entertaining. Trying to return to that time isn't just idealistic, its the best way to handle it.

One thing your overlooking is that some of the safest steroids are the easiest to test for so athletes avoid them. If steroids were legal some of the safer roids people are avoiding now would be more popular.

All kinds of nonsense would be cleaned up if they legalized roids. When women are pregnant they produce a steroid called Nandrolone. There are credible claims of female Olympic athletes getting pregnant and then getting abortions so when Nandrolone shows up in their blood they can claim its all from when they were pregnant. Stuff like this would go away if roids were legalized.

[Sperm Edwards]

Legalizing roids because there are still violators makes as much sense as saying burglaries should be legalized because there are so many violators despite centuries of it being illegal. So we should make burglary legal now. Most good people still wouldn't commit burglary and even though the incidence will rise dramatically upon its legalization, at least we'd make those burglaries that do occur safer through regulation. lol

It's cheating and it's against the rules. Because there are still those who cheat, and in particular those who cheat and get away with it, doesn't mean you make the cheating legal. You keep it illegal and have consequences for violators.

One of the issues may be that the penalties simply aren't great enough.

Let's see...I could juice my way to a contract averaging $6M per year. If I get caught I forfeit 4 games salary ($1.5M) and keep 12 games' salary ($4.5M). Or I could stay off the juice and maybe make $1M or less (assuming I make the team in the first place). If the frist offense is a year suspension, returning of the prorated portion of any signing bonuses, and playing out the rest of your contract (non-guaranteed) at the league minimum, it would make things "safer" for more people than legalizing it outright. Now all that's left is getting the owners and NFLPA to agree to that, lol. But really, if they were serious about keeping steroids out of the game there would truly be a no-tolerance type policy like that one.

[Aten]

Gotta love the babe in the woods routine. News flash: we're dirty, just like everybody else and frankly probably more so. Insane good luck and the best staff in the business only go so far in explaining how we've been so healthy for so long. Four games of Pace is a small price to pay.

[Jbro22]

Gotta love the babe in the woods routine. News flash: we're dirty, just like everybody else and frankly probably more so. Insane good luck and the best staff in the business only go so far in explaining how we've been so healthy for so long. Four games of Pace is a small price to pay.

Ugh, hate when people ruin the forum with reality.

[The Crusher]

One thing your overlooking is that some of the safest steroids are the easiest to test for so athletes avoid them. If steroids were legal some of the safer roids people are avoiding now would be more popular.

All kinds of nonsense would be cleaned up if they legalized roids. When women are pregnant they produce a steroid called Nandrolone. There are credible claims of female Olympic athletes getting pregnant and then getting abortions so when Nandrolone shows up in their blood they can claim its all from when they were pregnant. Stuff like this would go away if roids were legalized.

This is a really good argument. Im not sure I agree with roids being legalized but this really is a good point. By making it illegal you force anyone to do it in a way that increses the risk of injury. To get the roids they have to take what they can get. Be it from a out of country source or any other source the quality control is questionable. Plus their is a right way and wrong way to administer anabolic steroids. With proper blood testing and delivery schedule you can really do it in a way thats not as dangerous. But when you force someone to hide in a basement and just push it in without any kind of check you really increase the chance of a terrible result.

[bitonti]

This is a really good argument. Im not sure I agree with roids being legalized but this really is a good point. By making it illegal you force anyone to do it in a way that increses the risk of injury. To get the roids they have to take what they can get. Be it from a out of country source or any other source the quality control is questionable. Plus their is a right way and wrong way to administer anabolic steroids. With proper blood testing and delivery schedule you can really do it in a way thats not as dangerous. But when you force someone to hide in a basement and just push it in without any kind of check you really increase the chance of a terrible result.

I can't wait until the world of tomorrow, where steroids are mandatory and the league is testing for bionic implants. "contestants cannot be more than 50% cyborg"

[Jetsfan80]

Banner, if people are getting away with using more exotic steroids, you don't just give up. You improve your technology and kick up the penalties. Some will still get away with it, but the solution is not simply to allow everyone to use. That is a God-awful strategy, for all the reasons everyone is bringing up. This is professional football, not a video game.

Further, your point on Priest Holmes is ludicrous. I'd argue that the reason there are so many injuries is BECAUSE of steroid use, not because one guy had 'em and the other didn't. And steroids wouldn't make a 5-11, 205 lbs. guy big enough to absorb a hit from a giant linebacker running at full speed.

[kelticwizard]

Permit steroid use and you are telling every kid in junior high school that working hard with weights etc is not enough-to make the team he has to adulterate his body with harmful substances.

This is a plan?

[RutgersJetFan]

I can't wait until the world of tomorrow, where steroids are mandatory and the league is testing for bionic implants. "contestants cannot be more than 50% cyborg"

I'm still waiting for hoverboards.

[bitonti]

Permit steroid use and you are telling every kid in junior high school that working hard with weights etc is not enough-to make the team he has to adulterate his body with harmful substances.

This is a plan?

i dont get this logic

things NFL players can do that minors in high school cannot: Drink, smoke, drive, vote, go to war, rent a car, date super models etc. they also get painkillers administered to them in the locker room, uppers, downers, and yes they juice too.

minors in high schools should not be using life in the NFL as some sort of guideline as a way to live. Unless they have a death wish...

[kelticwizard]

The best way to get to play in the NFL is to be a very good major college player. The best way to get to play at a major college is to be a very good high school player.

If I'm in junior high school and want to take the all-important first step to being an NFL player-making the high school team-and I sense that my competition for that position is taking steroids, what choice do I have? Get cut or take the steroids.

Even if I make the H.S. team as a second stringer without using steroids and I see the starter is using them, I'm going to be under tremendous pressure to take them.

Quite a few years ago the entire US weightlifting team poised to go to the Olympics was tested for steroids for the first time and guess what? They all failed. The few weightlifters who did not want to take the steroids simply laughed, because they had been saying all along that if you want to find out who was taking the steroids, the guys who won the Olympic positions were the place to start since they would not have won those positions if they didn't take steroids in the first place.

The same dynamic applies to football. Unless they keep steroids against the rules at all levels, athletes who don't want to take steroids will be forced to take them in order to compete with those who do.

[Klecko73isGod]

http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news;_ylt=AmlUmLVecv1T_Lt3VrascIZDubYF?slug=ap-texans-cushing

HOUSTON (AP)

[kelticwizard]

Totally agree. It's only four games.

Take your suspension and go on with your career-assuming you have one next year with no steroids to build you up.